The Killer

CHAPTER XVII IN THE TOWER

WHEN Detective Joe Cardona arrived at the huge Solwick Tower, in lower Manhattan, he stopped for a moment to stare upward toward the summit of the mighty monolith. Far up, at mountainous height above the street, a tiny pin point of a light denoted the location of Donald Gershawl’s penthouse.

Cardona did not enter the main door of the tremendous skyscraper. Instead, he went to a side entrance where a closed door barred his way. Cardona rang a bell. A grille work opened, and a face appeared. It was that of a watchman.

“Detective Cardona,” announced the sleuth. “From headquarters. To see Mr. Gershawl. Important.”

The wicket closed. A short while later, the door swung open. Cardona entered a square-shaped room. The door closed. On the wall near the door, the detective saw an interior telephone and a lever which was evidently used to open the metal door. Directly beyond was the entrance to an elevator. There was a closed archway at the left

This room had originally been designed as a special hallway where visitors would enter the elevator that went to the top of the Solwick Tower. Before the completion of the building, however, Donald Gershawl, who had financed the operation, decided to use the tower as a penthouse, not as a place for sight-seers.

Hence, the archway had been closed, and the small side entrance was kept shut. This square room had been transformed into an anteroom six hundred feet below the apartment which it served!

This was one of the unique arrangements which Commissioner Ralph Weston had pointed out when he had brought Detective Joe Cardona here to visit Donald Gershawl.

The swish of a descending elevator came from between the doors. The car had struck the air cushion. The doors opened, and the watchman ushered Cardona into the elevator. A uniformed operator — a husky fellow — closed the doors and started the car upward.

At the end of the ride, Cardona stepped off the elevator into a waiting room where an attendant was seated. This man inquired Cardona’s name; hearing it, he opened a massive door and ushered the detective into the apartment itself.

DONALD GERSHAWL termed this place a penthouse. Actually, it was an observation floor which had been made into an apartment. A little beyond the center hall was the huge cylinder that indicated a spiral stairway leading to the open observation tower above. All the windows of the penthouse opened on a balcony which stretched completely about this story of the building.

The attendant rapped on a door beside the big cylinder. In response to an order from within, he opened the portal.

Joe Cardona walked into a sumptuous living room. He found Donald Gershawl awaiting him.

The financier was a tall, well-built man of fifty-odd years. His square jaw was a token of the determination which had gained him his high position of wealth. His face was friendly and frank; his gray hair gave him a look of dignity which went well with his erect bearing.

“Good evening,” greeted Gershawl. “I am glad to see you again, Detective Cardona. What brings you here? Have you come from Commissioner Weston?”

“No,” returned Cardona, in a serious tone. “I haven’t seen the commissioner yet, Mr. Gershawl. I wanted to talk with you first. I have come here to warn you—”

Gershawl stopped abruptly as he was receiving a box of cigars which a servant had brought him.

“To warn me?” he questioned, with a puzzled look. “Against what? Against whom? Is there a conspiracy?”

“I’ll explain it all,” began Cardona. “There’s been murder—”

“Murder?” Gershawl’s tone became composed, though his face was grave. “Be seated, Mr. Cardona. Have one of these Coronas” — he extended the box of cigars as Cardona sat down — “and tell me of this matter. Murder, you say?”

“Yes.” Cardona brought the list from his pocket. “Look at this, Mr. Gershawl. Maybe it will explain itself.”

Donald Gershawl stared at his own name. Then he read the ones which were crossed out. His eyebrows furrowed. He nodded as he passed the sheet back to Cardona.

“You recognize the names?” asked the detective

“Certainly,” responded Gershawl. “I have been reading the newspapers quite closely. These three were murdered. The inference therefore, is—”

“That you are marked for the fourth victim.”

“Of the man with the gray fedora,” commented Gershawl, with a doubtful smile. “A rather vague description for so formidable an enemy. Tell me, Mr. Cardona, where did you find this list?”

“In the apartment of a man named Harland Mullrick,” announced Cardona. “It was clutched by the hand of a dead detective. He gasped the name of Slugs Raffney, a murderer for whom we are looking. Slugs Raffney, though, is but a tool in the hands of the chief killer. Harland Mullrick is the man we are after.”

“Is he the man from Mexico?”

“Yes. He had a Mexican servant, who was dead in the apartment. Have you ever heard of him, Mr. Gershawl?”

“I have,” responded the millionaire, with a short laugh. “His victims, though, were unknown to me until I read their names in the newspapers. I have something in common with them, however. I know much about Mexico.”

“Ah! Do you know anything about Mullrick?”

“Yes. I have information which I acquired only a short while ago — as lately, perhaps, as the time when you found this list. I have received a telephone call from a man who calls himself Harland Mullrick.”

“You have!”

“More than that. I have granted him an interview. I am expecting him at any minute. I thought when your call came up from below that he had arrived.”

Cardona sprang to his feet.

“Mr. Gershawl!” he exploded. “Mullrick is coming here to murder you!”

“Such,” said the millionaire quietly, “appears to be his intention. But I hold no apprehensions. I have received your warning. You are here. You will arrest him.”

“If he suspects a trap—”

“That would be unfortunate,” interposed Gershawl. “Unless, however, this murderer saw you enter and recognized you, I do not think that he will neglect the appointment. He is very anxious to see me. He wants to talk regarding Mexico.”

“So that’s his game,” mused Cardona. “You’re right, Mr. Gershawl. We can trap this scoundrel, unless—”

“Unless?”

“Unless he has a gang with him. Slugs Raffney and some of the mob that Raffney still has.”

“That’s right,” agreed Gershawl. “Those fellows were supposed to have killed Roy Selbrig, weren’t they? But how about the other deaths: Burton Blissip and Sidney Cooperdale?”

“Mullrick worked alone,” declared Cardona.

“He will try to work alone here, then,” nodded Gershawl.

“Can you be sure of that?” questioned Cardona eagerly.

“No question about it,” returned Gershawl, in a decided tone. “My anteroom, below, is protected against intruders. The watchman is too much of an obstacle. Then there is the elevator operator; the servant outside. I am well protected against disturbers, Mr. Cardona.”

“I see Mullrick’s game,” agreed the detective. “He is foxy. He has tricked you into letting him in here as a guest so—”

“And he will think he has me unawares,” injected Gershawl. “However, I can take care of that. Suppose, Mr. Cardona, that you station yourself behind that farther curtain. Be ready for my call. I shall also post my servants.”

“I can grab the man the minute he comes in.”

“Yes. That would be simpler. I have been wondering, though, just what his game may be—”

“That’s right!” blurted Cardona. “Say — if you can get him to talk a bit, we may find out why he killed those three men who had been to Mexico.”

“Precisely,” said Gershawl. “In the meantime—”

A RAP on the door came as an interruption. Gershawl called for the person to enter. The servant from outside stepped within.

“Mr. Harland Mullrick is in the anteroom, sir,” he said. “Are you ready for him to come up by elevator?”

“Yes,” decided Gershawl.

Cardona was about to object. Gershawl, however, explained the reason for the quick summons.

“He may suspect if I keep him waiting,” he said. “I had hoped we would have time to call my friend, the police commissioner. It is too late now. Get behind the curtain while I instruct my inside servants to be ready.”

Gershawl went out of the door. He returned in less than two minutes. He smiled approvingly as he noted that Cardona was well concealed behind the curtain. Gershawl sat down and puffed on his cigar. A minute later, someone knocked upon the door.

“Come in,” ordered the millionaire.

The door opened. In stepped a tall, stoop-shouldered man. His face bore the bronzed color of the tropics. It was Harland Mullrick. The visitor’s head turned right and left, with quick, suspicious glance.

Donald Gershawl arose to shake hands with his guest. He pointed to a chair. Mullrick stepped beyond it to place his coat and hat, which he was carrying, upon a small stand. It was then that Joe Cardona, behind the curtain, suppressed a triumphant gasp.

Mullrick’s actions; his appearance; his stooped shoulders: these were evidences that he was the man Cardona wanted. The final touch, however, lay in the hat that rested upon the stand. It was spotless, unusually light in shade; the kind of hat that anyone would have quickly noted in the darkness.

The hat was a gray fedora. Joe Cardona’s fingers tightened on the butt of his revolver.